


Spider-Man isn't that cool

by thesecretsoftheuniverse



Series: Parkner Week 2019 [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Iron Man 3 - Fandom, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Bisexual Peter Parker, First Kiss, Harley Keener Is An Idiot, Identity Porn, Identity Reveal, Jealousy, M/M, Not Beta Read, Parkner Week 2019, Peter Parker Feels, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2019-08-02
Packaged: 2020-07-29 07:03:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20078125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesecretsoftheuniverse/pseuds/thesecretsoftheuniverse
Summary: The boy’s personality was great and he was insanely attractive, what with his bright eyes and wild curls, his devastating smirk and toned upper body.He was perfect. Except for one little thing.Harley Keener hated Spider-Man.





	Spider-Man isn't that cool

**Author's Note:**

> i saw all the fics where harley had a crush on spider-man and went 'what if harley hated spider-man? haha just kidding....unless?'
> 
> this is the result

Chemistry had always been one of Peter’s favourite subject, even before he decided to start reading college level chemistry books for fun he found himself more relaxed in that class than in any other. He knew he was good at chemistry and way ahead of the other students. He may never brag about it, but it gave him just a little over an hour to relax and recharge for any other classes that he might have after chemistry, since he didn’t really have to pay attention to anything. 

With the start of senior year though, chemistry became one of the most stressful classes Peter had to sit through on a regular basis. It had nothing to do with the teacher or the material. Even most of the other students were fine and he got along pretty ok with them. No, the problem in chemistry class that year was his neighbour. 

Unfortunately for him that year Ned was put into a different chem class and therefore Peter had to suffer through everything by himself. Sure MJ was there, but she rather enjoyed watching him suffer and make a fool of himself. 

It started innocently enough. A new student came to Midtown High, apparently smart enough to get a scholarship even for just the last year of high school. He said his family moved to New York from Tennessee for work related reasons and he decided to try and get into their school. He introduced himself on the first day and then asked Peter if the seat next to him was taken. When Peter told him it was not, he sat down. And apparently decided that it would be his seat for the rest of the senior year. Why? Who knew? Probably MJ, but she only ever kept laughing at Peter’s red face. 

Harley Keener was actually a really smart guy. Though his talents lied more in the engineering side of things, he understood chemistry pretty well and rarely ever asked Peter for help on things. Which was appreciated, Peter did not enjoy to just be the guy who does your work for you. He loved helping other students, but he despised being used for projects and homework simply because everyone knew he was good at it so they wouldn’t have to do the work themselves. 

So yeah, he was smart and funny, pretty kind, if not very sarcastic and had the prettiest blue eyes Peter had ever seen. 

Contrary to popular belief, Peter Parker is not a complete idiot and he had figured out that he likes both boys and girls when he was 13. So he always knew it was possible for him to have a crush on a guy, very likely in fact. 

He just didn’t expect it to be Harley Keener. Sure, the boy’s personality was great and he was insanely attractive, what with his bright eyes and wild curls, his devastating smirk and toned upper body. 

He was perfect. Except for one little thing. 

Harley Keener hated Spider-Man. 

Now, he did not hate Spider-Man the same way that guy from the Daily Bugle or General Ross did. No, he didn’t hate Spider-Man because he was a super-powered being with a secret identity. He just simply had something against Queen’s very own superhero. 

Which would’ve been fine if he hadn’t decided to attend the possibly only high school in New York that was entirely pro-Spidey. There were literal fan groups for the masked hero, everyone loved the guy and would defend him to their last breath (or so they claimed). 

Harley Keener was the only person in a school of around a thousand people who hated Spider-Man. 

Which is why he immediately noticed that the only person (besides MJ, but she doesn’t count) who didn’t actively fawn over the vigilante was Peter Parker.

Oh, he had been hanging out around Peter for a while now, though he wouldn’t exactly admit to himself why. So of course he noticed that while Peter’s bestie Ned loved to gush about Spider-Man Peter stayed more quiet and skeptical of everything. 

So Harley Keener decided that Peter Parker would be the perfect outlet for all his criticism and frustrations about the neighbourhood vigilante. 

Uh-oh. 

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Peter Parker wanted to die. Honestly, the ground could just swallow him whole. 

There were many times over the years where the young hero asked himself what in the world he could’ve done so wrong that the universe decided to punish him. 

Others may call him dramatic, but he truly wanted to simply disappear, preferably into some dark corner on the ceiling of an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. 

He had a huge problem: his crush, Harley Keener, who decided to insert himself into his friend group recently chose to start ranting about all of Spider-Man’s flaws and annoyances to the one and only Peter Parker. 

So yeah, Peter had a problem. 

He tried to stop either things, he really did. 

He tried to stop crushing on the southern guy, wanting so badly to just see him as a friend and nothing more so he would maybe stop getting heart palpitations every time he saw him and stop feeling incredibly useless when the guy mentioned just how little he actually thought about his alter ego, Spider-Man. 

But it was impossible to stop crushing on him when he hung around him and his friends so much. He tried to stop it but then Harley would smirk in his direction and the effort would be in vain. He was gone on the taller guy, always waiting for a smile turned his way, for the laughter lighting up the room and for his ridiculously beautiful eyes to shine a bit brighter when looking at puny Peter Parker.

He knew for sure that any attempt to stop himself for developing feelings for Harley would be useless when he saw the boy jump on his motorcycle and drive off or when he noticed the way the other teens’ shirt would stretch over his upper body in gym class. 

So he decided to try and tell Harley that he truly didn’t think that Spider-Man was that bad, but that too failed when he noticed the boy walk into the room wearing a fucking leather jacket and smirking at him at 8am. All words left him and he spent the rest of the day trying to reboot his brain. 

It became even worse when one day Spider-Man stopped a civilian from being mugged and it turned out that said civilian was none other than Harley Keener. So while he was trying to recover from the shock of seeing Harley outside of school, he got a lecture about how he should stop assuming that everyone is helpless and needs Spider-Man and how if he thought he would get gratitude he could stick it up his ass.  
Charming. 

The next day Harley was still seething and would barely even listen to anyone. Most students strayed from him and even MJ looked confused at just how angry the teenager was. 

When she figured out it was because of Spider-Man again she simply rolled her eyes, hit him in the head with her book and went back to reading.  
Helpful.

Peter had no idea what to do about the entire situation. 

So after weeks of desperation he simply resigned himself to liking a guy that would hate him the second he found out his secret. 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………

It went on like that for a few weeks. Peter went to school, Peter saw Harley, Harley smiled at Peter, Peter’s heart began to race, Peter did schoolwork, Harley sat with them during lunch, Harley complained about Spider-Man, Peter’s heart got crushed, Peter continued school work, Peter went home, Peter went on patrol, Peter tried not to drown in self-pity. 

Even his Aunt May figured out something was wrong, but he didn’t want to admit to her why he occasionally decided to eat three entire buckets of ice cream at once. 

He met with Mr. Stark three times a week, trained with Agent Carter two times a week, and spent a lot of time in the workshop working on his suit and trying to ignore the rest of the world. It was taxing, but fun. 

The routine would’ve stayed the same if someone hadn’t figured out that Tony Stark’s personal driver and bodyguard routinely picked up some teenager from Midtown High. Both Happy and Mr. Stark promised that the newspapers would never get wind of it and that they would keep an eye on anyone even thinking of putting the students in any kind of danger. Unfortunately the bad guys were faster. 

One day, a Tuesday because Tuesdays suck like that, Peter and his friends were spending some time in the chemistry lab when suddenly his spider senses started going wild. 

He immediately jumped up and wildly started looking around.

“Peter? PETER? What’s wrong?” Ned screamed, trying to get his attention. 

“I-I don’t know but something is very very wrong.” Peter stammered, still trying to figure out why he felt danger all around him. 

“Peter! Give me your arm!” MJ commanded and he did as he was told, looking at her strangely until he noticed that she had pressed the panic button on his watch that would alert Tony. 

“Guys? Can someone explain to me what the hell is going on?” Harley asked, looking at the group suspiciously. 

“Not now.” MJ replied. 

Suddenly Peter felt like back when Toomes kept flying around him and purposefully missing him in that warehouse on homecoming night. The ceiling. He looked up. And saw cracks starting to form on it.

“SHIT! We need to leave the room. NOW!” he yelled, pushing his friends in front of himself while the ceiling began to shake even more. MJ and Ned started running, dodging the tables and lab equipment strawn around the room and cursing all the way. Harley looked confused and stood frozen in place until Peter tried to grab his arm. 

“Peter what the fuck is going on?” Harley demanded. 

“The ceiling is going to fall, we need to MOVE Harley!” he answered, grabbing the other teens arm and yanking him with him. Ned and MJ were already outside, yelling at them to move faster when a huge piece of debris fell down right in front of them and forced them to stop. 

Harley stumbled back, trying to regain his balance but with the room shaking and the fear freezing him in place he fell flat on his ass. 

Then another piece started getting loose and falling, Harley narrowly avoiding it because he was somehow yanked away from being crushed by it in the last second. 

Ned and MJ were still screaming and cursing in the background but Harley looked down and saw a piece of web connecting him and Peter and froze, eyes never moving from the string-like concoction that just saved his live, or at least most of his bones. 

Peter froze as well, noticing the other teen’s stare and panicking slightly. Not only because his crush just figured out he was secretly his most hated person but also because the rest of the ceiling was about to fall onto them. 

So he did the only thing he knew to do, he pushed Harley down, making him land on the floor once again and trying to get him near the exit of the room and let go of the piece of spiderweb to catch the rest of the falling ceiling just above his head. 

He let out a breath, making sure nothing else would fall before turning and throwing it all toward the windows so it wouldn’t hit Harley. 

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Silence hung in the air uncomfortably for a couple of minutes. Peter decided to just turn around and face it now before his crush decided to go screaming about Spider-Man’s identity to the whole school. 

He turned slowly, trying to delay the inevitable. 

The only thing he saw when he was completely turned was Harley, sitting on the ground and staring at him with wide eyes and an open mouth. 

He coughed slightly and offered the other teen a hand to get up, trying to come up with something to say after the whole shitshow that just went down. 

Harley got up slowly, eyes never straying from him for even a second. 

“So..” Peter started, looking down at his shoes and not continuing because what could he possibly say to him now? 

“I-” Harely started. “I’m sorry.” 

That startled him, he looked back at the taller teen in confusion. “What?!” he asked in shock. 

“I said I’m sorry.” Harley replied. “I was a dick and I-...I shouldn’t have said that stuff about you.” he explained with a sigh. 

Peter sighed as well. “I just...don’t really understand why you hate Spider-Man that much.” he said quietly, hoping to finally get an explanation. 

“I don’t know I-” he bit his lip nervously, obviously trying to find the right words. “I think I was jealous?” he admitted. 

“Jealous? And what? Now you suddenly don’t hate him anymore since you found out it’s me?” Peter repeated, genuinely confused by both things. 

“NO! Well..it just makes me realise how dumb all my complaints were I guess.” Harley explained, pouting slightly. “And yeah I guess I was jealous because I’d known Tony since that thing with the Mandarin and then he suddenly started talking to me less and I guess I projected my frustrations and stuff onto Spider-Man because he would talk about you a lot whenever we did manage to get in contact.” he continued. “I didn’t even tell him that we moved to New York.” he confessed, head hanging down in shame and cheeks slightly red. 

“Mandarin?” Peter repeated confused. “Wait? You’re the potato gun kid?!” 

Harley’s head shot up. “You know about that?” he asked.

“Yeah, he talks about you all the time, has a potato gun sitting in his lab at all times.” Peter explained, laughing slightly.

That made Harley blush even more. “Oh..” he said with a small smile. “Maybe I’ve been an idiot.” 

“Definitely.” Peter confirmed with a snort and Harley smirks at him. 

Peter heard the sound of police cars and ambulances getting closer. Instead he focused on Harley who was still standing in front of him, now staring at him intensively with those blue eyes, breathing harder than before. 

“I mean, I was right about one thing.” Harley started. 

“Oh?” Peter asked, voice almost a whisper now. 

“Yeah..Spider-Man isn’t that cool.” he repeated. 

Before Peter could even respond he felt himself yanked closer, his face suddenly only a few inches apart from Harley’s. He couldn’t stop himself from staring at the guy’s lips, ignoring everything around him. 

“Peter Parker is much better.” Harley whispered before closing the distance completely and putting their lips together. 

Peter melted against him, stepping closer so they were standing chest to chest in the middle of a ruined classroom. They kissed for a while, going from soft and sweet kisses to frantic and hard ones, Harley’s hands cupping Peter’s face and Peter wrapping his arms around Harley’s neck to pull him even closer and eliminate any amount of space left. 

They only pulled back when the need for air became unbearable, lips swollen and as red as the rest of their face. 

Just before either teenager could say something or lean in again, the sound of repulsors became louder and louder until Iron Man was standing in the middle of the rubble filled classroom. 

“Hey Mr. Stark.” Peter greeted, voice creaking slightly and still wearing a slightly dazed look.

The face plate opened up and the man inside stared at the teen. “Hey Pete, you doing ok?” he asked with a raised eyebrow, only getting a nod in return. 

The man turned to look at the other teen and promptly froze. “Harley?” he exclaimed. 

“Hey Mechanic.” the taller boy greeted in return, face still as red as before. 

“What are you doing here?” the genius asked. 

“Harley moved here a while ago but didn’t tell you because he was throwing a temper tantrum because you didn’t give him enough attention.” MJ explained, slowly making her way back into the classroom. 

“What?!” the older man asked. 

“Apparently Harley was jealous that you talked about Spider-Man so much and didn’t have time to call him anymore so he decided not to tell you that his family moved to New York.” Ned explained calmly, stepping into the room as well. 

“Um...how long have you guys been standing there?” Harley asked, slightly embarrassed. 

“We stood there the whole time idiot, you two were just busy staring and then sucking the lives out of each other.” MJ told them. 

“Um..” Peter started, face heating up again. 

“Well...I’m glad I left a meeting for this.” Stark said, still looking around the room like it was one huge pipe dream.

**Author's Note:**

> idk how or why this ended up being so long but oh well 
> 
> also I'm terrible at naming fics


End file.
